That first scheduled appointment is a critical turning point in the sales relationship, but getting that far usually takes more contact attempts and considerably more persistence than most reps possess. To take advantage of the wealth of hidden opportunities on your calling lists you need to make a dedicated effort to reach every viable contact – not just the ones that are easy or easily recognizable. Cold calling is a challenge for sales reps and always has been. It's time consuming, repetitive, low payoff and emotionally difficult, but still an important part of the job. With the obstacle of voicemail added and the expected low rate of returned calls, it can be difficult to see the pay off for your company. (Although if you’re not sure it's worth it – stop, and watch your numbers tumble.) Cold calling is a numbers game and you simply must deliver the numbers to reap the rewards. To do that, delegate most of your cold call attempts to guided voicemail, to deliver those super-achieving call objectives, while maintaining realistic expectations for your sales team.

Time limited sales promotions and introductory offers are an outstanding way to achieve a short term sales lift, (and boost your long term revenue as well) but they pose some difficulties. What's the best way to communicate the details of your offer, in a time-limited window? Most companies will opt for email blasts, which are becoming progressively less effective as both customers and prospects are overwhelmed by the sheer volume of incoming emails and spam filters block an unknown number of your messages. Calling campaigns are among the sales strategies used to overcome the clutter of email and emphasize the importance of your promotions. But frequently, there are too many people to call and not enough callers to reach them. That's when to add guided voicemail to exponentially extend your reach within a shortened timeline. Create a great message around a strong offer. Enthusiastically delivered, at the right time it will drive inbound calls to your sales team and explode your sales productivity. Now, that's how to increase sales.

Every year, countless thousands of dollars worth of sales leads are generated and then wasted due to a lack of consistent, timely follow up. There are many reasons this happens including sales people with other immediate priorities, a lack of company focus and standards for lead follow up, limited marketing credibility among the sales team, cherry picking only the best leads, an inability to manage the ongoing volume and periodic bursts of heavy lead activity that cannot be serviced. There are other reasons too, but there is also an obvious solution. Guided voicemail campaigns and messages are created and fine tuned in advance, tailored to different audience types and/or lead sources and deployed faster than any calling campaign can be organized. By using one or a series of carefully selected messages, you can direct your leads into different qualification streams, providing timely and useful information to bridge the gap, until your sales team makes their own in-person contact. To increase your sales, ensure that every lead you've invested in gets a dedicated effort and real opportunity to become a new sale for your business.